I’ve been thinking a lot about how seven years seems like so long . . . and like it was only yesterday.

When I talked to Kyle this morning, he said I’d missed a call from him (I was unhooking the truck and trailer) just moments after he left the house. Apparently, there was some sort of ceremony taking place at our neighbourhood’s new Heroes Park. Kyle said there were police cars and sixty or so people; traffic being directed manually, etc. He was hoping to tell me, so I could run down there . . . and I would have!

As it was, immediately after unhitching my rig, I chose to remember 9-11 by doing some searching online regarding any ceremonies taking place in New York or Washington. I learned that today was the day the new Memorial site at the Pentagon was dedicated. I went to the television, but could find nothing, so I read everything I could find online. Entering the new memorial, visitors pass under an archway marked with a stone carved: “September 11, 2001–9:37 a.m.,” the exact time of the Pentagon attack. The stone itself bears the scars of that attack—it is a stone recovered from the smouldering, wrecked wall of the building. The architecture of the park is arranged in rows, symbolizing the years in which the victims were born. The surrounding wall doesn’t just keep out the freeway noise—it’s built beginning at a height of three inches and rises to 71 inches—it symbolizes the youngest victim, a three-year-old, and the oldest. The park consists of a bench, a pool of water and a tree, for each of the 184 victims of the terrorist attack on the Pentagon. Each bench bears the name of someone who died there that day. To read the names of those who died within the walls of the Pentagon, you must face the building. To read the names of those who died on American Airlines flight #77, you must stand facing the western sky.

I found some footage of a lone bagpiper walking among the benches as he plays “Amazing Grace.” And I found a couple of nice news reports about the new site. I also learned that at 3:30 p.m., both Obama and McCain gathered with folks at Ground Zero in Manhattan to remember the lost, there. I’m hoping to find some footage of that. We, as Americans need to remember much, much more often, how we pulled together on that day, and think far, far, less of how different we think we are, one from another. That the two candidates joined for this event, today, is heartwarming. Kyle had said he hoped something like that would be done, and I doubted the likelihood. I’m glad I was wrong.

As I drove home this afternoon, I took a quick, impromptu turn in at Heroes Park. I did a U-turn, and parked my truck, immediately across from a no parking sign. (Isn’t that crazy? Where are we supposed to park to visit this little place?) I walked down the marked path, and read the engravings, such as: responsibility, sincerity, dedication, sacrifice. I walked all the way down to the wall bearing the names of Arlington’s fallen in the line of duty. Under each name, is either a Fire or Police Department badge symbol, and the words “Last Call” or “End of Watch” with a date. A beautiful wreath seemed to be perhaps a remnant of this morning’s ceremony. And I picked up a piece of trash and carried it back to my truck. <sigh>

10 November 2007
I took other photos on the 10th, but I’m using this one because it beggars me. I don’t understand. We are in the midst of one of the worst fuel crises in modern history (not the worst, mind you, when adjusted for inflation) and yet our nation’s gluttonous population insists on driving vehicles that are notoriously poor on gas mileage. I drive a small Mitsubishi because I have no reason to drive anything larger. In this photo we see three vehicles, all of which are larger than a)mine and b)their occupancy requirements:
All three of these vehicles had one occupant (visible – if someone was ducking out of view, certainly I wouldn’t have noticed): the driver. I respect others need for larger vehicles. Large families, the working class (labourers, farmers &c.) and haulers need the larger vehicle. My wife drives a hugely inefficient gas guzzler because she needs to. She needs the space to haul product back and forth across the state (and nation at times). She needs the heavy-duty tow package because she pulls around a trailer that that is longer and taller than her Yukon. There wasn’t a tow package on any of the vehicles in front of me. All of them were squeaky clean on the exterior which leads me to beleive that they don’t travel off-road very often, if at all, which means they probably weren’t working-class vehicles. Going back to a previous statement, all of them had one occupant so I can make the leap that they weren’t for large families (although that is a leap, I have no evidence one way or another). So, I have to ask again, why? Why do we continue to line the pockets of big oil and foreign nations by driving unncecessarily large and inefficient vehicles when other choices are available?
Cheers.

8 September 2007
As I've mentioned before I pay attention to the photo "assignments" that come my way via blogs & forums I subscribe to. Two of the three assignments I get each week are assigned on Friday while the third comes to me on Monday. This week's Friday assignments were Purple & Soft. It is the Wednesday after those two assignments came out, but I'm posting for that Saturday photo. This is Purple.
I was driving through a parking lot in South Arlington and my eyes were drawn to the purple newspaper box and the purple lightposts just outside the Taco Bell. But, I wasn't overwhelmed with the composition opportunities. Then, but 30 feet way, someone had dropped an empty Kleenex box next to an abandoned Mexican restaurant. Aha. So, now we have a Purple Kleenex box as fulfillment for Assignment number one. I'm sure that I gathered many a look as I crawled around in the filthy parking lot looking for a good angle to shoot my Purple. I think I got it with this one. I like the overall arrangement and exectuion of the image, even though it is a photo of someone's refuse.
I threw the box in the trash. Couldn't have someone else taking a photo of a Purple Kleenex box, could I?
Cheers.

6 September 2007
What a day. What a very, very long – yet fulfilling – day. The four of us, Lou, Terrill, Eric & myself spent the entire day in work, debug, work some more mode. It was quite fulfilling and proved the validity of the trip. However, by the end of the day, I was completely knackered. Lou took us to a place called Carasello for fairly decent, if expensive, Italian food. Then it was back to the hotel for some late night comeraderie and expensive drinks. Then it was to bed for another early morning the next day. And nary a photo in the entire proceedings. So, we have this lovely photo of the parking lot lights through a filthy (!!) window.
Hooray.
Cheers.

~KR (6 September 2007)

Listening to: Winner Take All by Styx
on Come Sail Away: The Styx Anthology

5 September 2007
The day started well enough, went rapidly downhill and then levelled out. It started raining in the morning then I got a call requiring an emergency side-trip before getting on my flight to LGA. No resolution was generated by my side trip, sadly, but there’s a certain satisfaction in knowing that I’ve done everything right. Now, I just need to follow up and ensure that the parties that can fix the problem do fix the problem. The flight was uneventful, and after a quick seat-shuffle, not even too uncomfortable. We (Eric, Terrill & myself) arrived at La Guardia airport where Lou picked us up. We then high-tailed (actually not so much with the high-tailing, the traffic was horrendous!) it to Flushing Bayside for dinner & drinks.
This is Maggie May’s. An unassuming, but lovely pub with one of the most delightful barmaids I’ve seen in quite some time. Dawn (that was her name) was very witty and very on-the-spot. She even knew how to draw a good pint of Guinness! Anyway, the four of us finished up some hardware tinkering we had to do while we had our drinks. Then off to Bourbon Street for dinner. Bourbon Street is a N’awlins influenced restaurant across from Margaritas. I could have spent hours and hours and hours up & down the streets here. It reminded me of Nob Hill in Portland. The business trip was just starting.
Cheers.

4 September 2007
It's Monday, September 10th and I'm just getting to photos taken on September 4th. The woes of a busy work schedule. The worst part about posting nearly a week after the photo was taken is that by that time I've lost the emotion that sparked the photo in the first place. I'm sure that this photo sparked some sort of righteous outrage in me. But, I can't recall exactly.
I would imagine that I felt appalled at the state of our society. That I was angry at the volume of trash caught in the wheels. That perhaps I was even covertly thinking about how to get that shopping cart out of the drainage ditch and into my smallish car. Really, who hasn't wanted a shopping cart at one point or another. But today, six days later, I can't tell you a thing about what I was thinking.
Cheers.

27 August 2007
Still working on the Texture assignment, sort of. So, that's what this photo is:
This is a bungee cord attached to the side of a large trailer that was completely full of trash. Refuse. Garbage. Rubbish. It was an amazing, if disgusting, sight to see. I suppose I should just be glad that all that trash was constrained by this sequence of bungee cords and grates rather than scattered about the ground.
Cheers.

8 August 2007
As if I couldn’t get enough of airports, off I had to go. Back to DFW on the 8th to get my hands measured. Yeah. New bio-metric measurements required for all badge-carrying employees. Luckily it was pretty quick & easy (unlike my last trip to that office). On the way out, back to my car, I happened to look up as I was crossing the street. The juxtaposition caught my eye and out came the camera.
This is part of Terminal D at DFW. It truly is an excellent terminal with so much on offer, including the beautiful Grand Hyatt Hotel.
Cheers.

~KR (8 August 2007)

Listening to:Song of the Dunadan by Glass Hammer
on Journey Of The Dunadan

2 July 2007
The view from my office looking out over the parking garage. During a rain storm…again.
The official rainfall for the Dallas-Ft. Worth Metroplex is measured and kept at DFW Airport (less than 1 mile from where this photo was taken). The month of June officially saw 11.1″ of rain. That makes this June the wettest June in over 70 years. It also makes this June the wettest month in the DFW area in 28 years. That’s a lot of rain.
In all honesty, I cannot recall a July 2nd where the grass on my drive to and from work is all green. I can’t recall a July 2nd where I have a lawn that’s worth a damn. I can’t recall a July 2nd where the temperature overnight was in the low 70’s. If the weather was like this (including the rain) every summer, I’d be a lot less bitter about living in Texas.
Cheers.

5 April, 2007
The day started early…very early. I had a 6:45 am flight from DFW to EWR for a meeting with a potential vendor. As I do, I took numerous photos inside the beautiful D Terminal at DFW, but none of them made the cut this time, because on the transit from EWR to JFK to take a flight out that evening (yeah, it was a day-trip *shudder*) we took the I248 over the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. What a glorious, if badly in need of some paint and loving, structure. Lou, who was driving the car lives in the area and was full of knowledge as were Greg and Rich, who both grew up in the area. I’d never been across this bridge before; and I can’t imagine a better way to travel across it than with these three very knowledgeable gentlemen. This photo is of the Manhattan side support as viewed from Dyker Beach Park in Brooklyn. Named for Italian explorer Giovanni de Verrazano, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world at the time of its completion in 1964 and remained so until 1981. It is now the 7th longest suspension bridge in the world but remains the longest in the US.
The bridge connects Staten Island to Brooklyn and is widely considered to be the entry point to Manhattan. It is the starting point for the world-renknowned New York City Marathon and marks the entrance to New York Harbor. These are just a few of the fascinating bits of information imparted to me during that 2.5 hour drive from Newark Airport to JFK Airport. Thanks, guys.
Cheers.